In 1999, Beam first tested the aging stratosphere with the 18-year-old, a collaboration between Booker Noe, the grandson of Jim Beam and creator of Booker’s True Barrel, and Alain Royer, the renegade Cognac maker and cigar aficionado from the Fussigny house. The trick was an extra year or more of finishing in a Cognac barrel. The result was sublime, a huge Bourbon flavor loaded with all the orange, leather, vanilla, maple, nuts and honey of Booker’s, but without the attendant heat. The Cognac cultured the backwoodsman with utter finesse and also left its distinct brandy taste on the palate.